


Walking Memories, Searching for Meaning

by RequiemForAbsolution



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Angst, Bad Dreams, Canon character deaths, Discussion of Death, Emptiness, Good Dreams, Heartbreak, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Memories, Obsession, Repaying Debts, Trying to Understand, and why we're still alive, falling asleep, lack of emotions, old debts, searching for meaning, what does it mean, why we had to die
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-20
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-07 10:24:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13432725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RequiemForAbsolution/pseuds/RequiemForAbsolution
Summary: Roxas is dreaming of lives he's never lived, and emotions he's never had. Now he's slipping into obsession with things he doesn't understand, and searching for answers that might not even exist. Or: Ventus saved Ienzo's life. Now Roxas calls upon Zexion to save him from this emptiness.Update: Ienzo lost a hero, and is scared of the walking corpse wearing his face. Zexion doesn't care, except he really does.Update: Roxas came looking for answers, and found his true names instead. Zexion gets a hug.Update: Axel's smile makes Roxas feel something that could almost be happiness.





	1. Roxas

He dreams.

There are flashes of memories that he knows do not belong to him. Of blue hair and laughter and starlike flowers in the moonlight; of warmth and safety and the smell of sweaty leather. Of red hair and the smell of the sea and the smiling crinkles beside ocean-green eyes.

It’s the same, every night. And every night he wakes up, with an empty ache in the hole where his heart should be. A sense of loss deeper than he can comprehend grips his stomach in cold fingers, and even though he’s told that his emotions are self-serving lies, he cannot stop himself from crying.

It’s so cold, in the Castle. The air is always sterile and still. The golden moon is always shining that frozen, bitter light over the black city. His tears are warm on his skin, but the moment they sink into the cool fabric of his pillow they are cold too.

He doesn’t tell anyone. Until there’s an exhausting mission that he slugs through with Axel: fire and light and heat burning away the grass surrounding them; the dissolving screams of the Heartless (because they can _feel_ too, of course they can, but who amongst them has the heart to care?) and the too-blue sky above; until they step through the familiar cool rush of darkness and arrive in the peace and warmth of Twilight Town.

It’s there that he sits with Axel, and watches the eternal sunset. And it’s there that tiredness takes over his body, and he falls asleep against his best friend’s shoulder.

This time he dreams of a world with a cold pink sky and blue stone fields to the horizon. With a grey castle glittering in the dawn light and fountains sparkling silver amongst the gardens. He’s running into a courtyard, and there are monsters

( _Unversed_ )

surrounding a child in a white coat. He does not have time to hesitate and he _does not_ hesitate. His keyblade is in his hand in a flash, and in his dream he has time to think that he’s holding it wrong: it’s backwards in his hand, the spikes facing a different way than they should. But then he’s swinging, and the jittering black monsters are dissipating into black smoke.

He turns, and sees the child.

A boy. Maybe nine years old, with a heavy fringe of grey-blue hair covering one eye. His face is devoid of any expressions, and Roxas

( _Ventus_ )

feels a chill run down his spine. And _that_ is new too, because he has felt grief and loss and emptiness before but never something as nuanced and intricate as the emotion that in his memories he knows is called _discomfort_. But this child brings a _feeling_ of something that makes his stomach twist and his lungs tighten, at the same time that something in his chest aches and his eyes suddenly burn.

_It’s revulsion,_ Roxas thinks to himself in the memory-dream, and even in the grip of it he cannot help but savour this new word. _And pity, too._

It’s a rush of blood to the head, to know that he is _remembering feelings_ , because unlike the others, he was born without memories. It’s heady and addictive and painful and it hurts but he feels alive, more alive than he has since this waking nightmare began. And suddenly he understands Demyx, with a twist of clarity that is _so sweet_ in how much delicious sadness it wrings from this remembered heart that is not his own. He understands why someone who _feels nothing_ dedicates so much time and energy to pulling smiles onto a blank face, to laughing and enjoyment and pleasure. Because it is the closest thing they have to knowing real joy, and if sadness can feel this good, surely only happiness can feel better.

But that is all the time he has to think on it.

He steps forward, towards the blank child. He’s about to reach out and speak –

_“Hey, wake up, sleepyhead!”_

– and then he’s back in Twilight Town. Axel is laughing beside him.

“Wow, we really wore you out, huh?”

It’s then that Roxas tells him what’s been happening in his dreams. He doesn’t know what he expects from Axel (what _can_ you expect from a friend who can’t feel?), but when he gets a clap on the shoulder and a tired smile, he can’t help but feel a little better.

“It happens. Ain’t nothing we can do about it, either. Enjoy it while it lasts, Roxas, because that’s the closest we can all get to being real.”

And then he grins. It’s not his predatory smile, the one that’s all sharp teeth and mocking eyes. This is a smile that only Roxas thinks he ever gets to see: relaxed and thoughtful and amused. The hand that’s on his shoulder squeezes and then releases, but remains there – a steady, warm weight.

“C’mon. Let’s get you back to the Castle.”

So they go. Axel leaves him in the common room, and goes to talk to Demyx. Like always, the musician is smiles and laughter. Roxas wants to feel that stinging pity again, but there’s only a dull and empty ache instead. And just like that, he can’t stand his own life anymore. He storms to bed with what should be anger and is just clomping footsteps, and he slams his door but takes no satisfaction from the heavy _crack_ it makes.

Now that he knows what emotions are, he wants them back. He knows why they’re collecting hearts, too. But that greater mission doesn’t seem important right now. Instead he sheds his coat and then digs himself into his bed. A moment later his eyes are closed and he’s restlessly rolling back and forth, trying to get comfortable on the mattress, trying to burrow his way back into sleep.

The hours dwindle by.

He can’t even have the satisfaction of feeling frustrated about it.  

Roxas opens his eyes, and stares at the ceiling.

It’s raining outside, and lightning cracks the midnight sky. He stands and walks to the window, and stares down at the black geometric squares of the city. There are shadows navigating the darkened streets, with roughly humanoid shoulders hunched against the rain. Cold golden lights shine into empty buildings. Somewhere out there is an electrical hum, barely audible through the rain.

He tries to remember the grey courtyard, and the pink sky. But the shape and feelings of the memories have almost gone. He can only see a blur of faded colours, and the jittering movements of those monsters that he’d fought. He tries to think of the child, but his face swims out of proportions and size. From a child to an adult, from a white coat to a black cloak.

_Zexion._

Roxas stares at his own reflection in the rainy glass. His skin is pale, his eyes wide and shocked.

A moment later he is gone, his own cloak snatched from the bed as he runs. 

If he can't have his own memories, then he'll find the answers from someone else's. 


	2. Zexion

Hearts could be taken, but not memories.

There was an entire dissertation that could have been written about his reaction to seeing their new member, Zexion thought wryly. Or rather, the lack of his reaction; _that_ was what someone might have called _an issue_. Or even _the defining experience of being Nobody._

Thirteen had been introduced in the same way that they all had; shown, like a specimen before scientists (and some of them were still scientists, despite all else) in their meeting room, beneath their high thrones. Roxas had walked in, as broken as a corpse, his eyes completely devoid of life.

Inside Zexion, Ienzo had screamed.

But of course he had. Ienzo was still nothing more than a child, who had been saved by a boy with a magical blade. Of course he had come to worship Ventus and the stories of the stars, and doors that could only be unlocked with magic gifted to a chosen few. Of course he had dreamed about what it would have been like if he could have gone on adventures with him, been _chosen_ as a companion rather than kept around out of an old man’s pity.

And when he had died…

When darkness had fallen on the Garden, and Ienzo was the last one alive in the castle…

When he had watched each and every one of his teachers and protectors die…

When his little legs had stumbled through the long hallways, and he had hugged a big book to his chest, with tears and snot and vomit pouring down his face…

_Of course_ it had been Ventus he wished for. His voice had been too choked to form the words _help me_ , and even if he could have spoken, his lungs were clenched with the terror of being heard by the living shadows that followed him, flickering like his own heart’s beat. There was blood splattered across the tiled floors, and he caught a glimpse of a big man’s crumpled body like a hideous, unreal nightmare.

Eventually he couldn’t run any more. His precious book had fallen from tired little hands, and he had crawled into the safety of a puddle of moonlight as if it could save him from the living night. There were a few precious moments there, where – looking up at the stars shining so brightly in the sky – he had _believed_ that Ventus would come, with a laugh and a smile, and save him from this world where he had lost everyone who had ever cared about him and everyone he had ever cared about.

The hot bite of a Shadow’s teeth sank in around his spine. It was bitten through with nothing more than a wet crack, and then Ienzo was helpless against the floor as teeth ate from his spine to his heart.

Ventus didn’t come, of course.

Zexion was born, and he no longer cared to believe in heroes.

He had become an adult in his death, when Ienzo had only been a child. And wouldn’t _that_ have been confusing, if only they had the capacity to be confused. By now, none of them particularly cared about anything outside of themselves.

Except that he had, in his own mind, silently buried Ienzo. He could not care for him, but he could respect his own memory if nothing else. He imagined a graveyard of blue flowers beneath a dawn sky, and a boy in a white coat sleeping beneath it.

He had certainly never expected Ienzo to _wake up_.

The only thing worse than your hero letting you die was watching them die themselves.

Roxas had walked into their room, and what remained of Ienzo lost hope.

Now Zexion sat awake in his room at night – or whatever could be called night, in a world that never knew sunshine – and turned the pages of his faithful Lexicon with a careful, practised hand. He weighed these matters in his mind as if they were academic, and despite their relevance to his life, he might have believed that he was truly dismissive of them.

Except that when a knock fell on his door, he knew exactly who it was.

And not even he, cold and calculating and ever the schemer, could deny the child’s wrecked dismay at his visitor.

Still, it would be impolite to ignore.

With that motivation – _and no other_ , Zexion reminded himself dismissively – he opened the door.

“Good evening, Roxas.”

 

 


	3. Roxas

The existence of a Nobody was, necessarily, the absence of emotion. It did not bother Roxas whether there were clouds in the sky, nor if the sun was shining, nor whether Axel had made a barbed joke that mocked him in some way. These things were, and though they could _confuse_ him if he did not understand them, he had no investment in them.

That was a very different feeling to this one.

His stomach had clenched into a tight ball with iron bands around it. His lungs had shrunk within his chest, and his breath had hitched in his throat. His hands curled into weak fists, and then his fingers fell open by his sides. The organ of his heart, that pumped blood through his body and nothing else, seemed to have squeezed to a standstill.

_Good evening, Roxas._

He heard the words and comprehended them. And of course he had seen Zexion before, either in the Castle or in the common room. Normally he carried a black book with him, and spoke little save to mock those around him or impart the necessary information to his colleagues. Roxas had never taken _notice_ of him, and had never truly _looked_ at him.

Now he did. And Zexion looked back.

He was only a few inches taller than Roxas himself. His body and face were like some sick mockery of childhood that had been bitterly mixed with a boy’s dreams of adulthood. Like badly imagined caricatures, his cheekbones were sharp but his chin was dull; his eyes were narrower but his mouth was still round; his stature was that of a small adult, but his proportions – arms and legs and waist – were all like a child’s would be.

_You’re what Ienzo imagined himself to be._

_But if you’re somebody else’s dream, whose am I?_

He drew himself out of his own thoughts and looked back at Zexion again. He wore a raised eyebrow and an inquisitive smile, as if this midnight visit was something that was almost normal. But they were machinations of the face, memories of emotions; beneath them, in the dark blue of his visible eye, there was nothing.

“Would you like to come in?”

“Y-Yeah.”

Zexion stood aside. His black cloak curled around his ankles, and Roxas noticed – briefly – that even his feet were childlike. Something that a child would not have bothered to imagine in _growing up_. More and more, he had the feeling that the nobody before him was still only eight years old, but dressed in a body that finally fit his mind.

“You seem troubled, Thirteen. What can I do for you?”

The room was as white as the rest of the castle. It was circular, with bookshelves that ringed it completely. And these were filled with bright colours, as many as a sunset in Twilight Town: reds and vivid greens and deep, oceanic blues. Their letters were a strange mix of different languages, and like another far-off memory, Roxas could almost understand their titles.

“Do you like them?”

“Um…”

There was no roof to the room. It was a dome of glass that offered a view only of the black sky outside. Raindrops trickled down the dome, and cast strange watery patterns across the shelved walls. Zexion sat on his bed, with his legs crossed neatly beneath him.

“I… remember you.”

Zexion merely raised an eyebrow at him. His visible eye remained empty. There was no emotion there, only the memory of proper expressions to wear. Like the memory of what a boy had wanted to be when he grew up.

“Or at least… I mean… I-Ie–”

“Do not say that name.”

Roxas stopped. A sharp intake of breath hissed through his teeth at the rebuke.

“We are not the people who met in our other lives. If your memories are coming back, then rest assured that it is normal. It may take you another month to remember more of who you once were. It has taken several of us many years to do so.”

“But not you.”

“ _He_ –” the word was carefully enunciated “ – died when the Garden was overrun, as did many others. We were able to fill in the blanks much more swiftly that way. For those who died alone, it is much more difficult.”

“Well I want to know. I want to know who I was!”

And at last, there was a flicker of _something_ there. Zexion ran a hand thoughtlessly over his heavy fringe and then cast it aside, revealing his entire face for just a heartbeat before his hair fell back into place. But lightning flashed at just the right time, and for a moment – oh, just for a _moment_ – Roxas _saw_ the outline of a child’s face beneath the adult’s, of rounder blue eyes that were watching him in something almost like fear.

Then the darkness had fallen again, and when Zexion spoke, his voice was perfectly cool and polite.

“I cannot tell you the answers that you are looking for. Your history is well-known enough throughout the Organisation that you should be able to ask any one of them the same thing that you’re here to ask me. But for the sake of saving you some late-night visits, let me tell you this much. You are remembering the life of someone whose name was Ventus. After he fell, his story was carried in the heart of someone named Sora. That is who you were. Now both of them sleep, and you walk with us.”

_Ventus._

_Sora._

The names were like music to his ears. He closed his eyes and strained his mind and…

_Warm moonlight over a green garden._

_Sunlight glittering on a blue-green sea._

… heard the faintest echo of laughter, somewhere far away.

His legs buckled beneath him. He hit the cold floor on his knees, beneath the cold moonlight, with Zexion’s cold blue eye watching his every move. And for the first time in his waking life, he _smiled_ , and the memory of happiness wrung through the memory of his heart.

_I have a real name._

“Don’t let yourself be caught by the past,” Zexion said softly. “It is gone. You do not have a heart. Do not let yourself believe that you do. What happened then is irrelevant to our mission now. That is what you must focus on, or else you will have no future, and only fading memories.”

The happiness faded. Roxas longed for it to come again. Then he looked up at Zexion’s too-childish face, and felt it stir again low and warm in his stomach, like a cloud of butterflies.

“Thank you. I-I… I know what you said, but this means a lot to me. Thank you!”

Another memory came to him, this one too strong to ignore. And without thinking to even question it, Roxas stood up from the floor, and threw his arms around Zexion in a tight hug.

It occurred to him, rather too late, that hugging a dead child’s heartless imagination might _not_ be a good idea. 

Oh well. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More ramblings. If you enjoyed it, or have any thoughts on it at all, please let me know. <3 Reviews make the world go 'round!


	4. Zexion

It would be a lie to state that he had never been touched since his death as Ienzo. The child had been the darling of his mother and father, and tucked into bed each night – until that fateful night when they had not returned home at all. Following that, he had been his master’s favourite student, and commended as a brilliant boy. He and his master would walk the terracotta hallways together, their fingers closely linked.

Since then?

His relationship with Lexaeus had satisfied any lingering sentimental needs he may have had. He did not deign to walk out onto the battlefield unless necessary, but there had been _so_ many times when it _had_ been necessary. And whenever that occurred, Lexaeus would hold him afterwards as they tended diligently to one another’s injuries. It was not much, but it let him have some inkling of the warmth that he had once taken for granted.

This, on the other hand.

When Lexaeus held him, it was all muscles and brawn. It was an overwhelming experience: sweat and muscle and blood and desperation. Zexion knew, better than he cared to admit, how much the memory of guilt tormented his bodyguard. And he knew, better than he cared to admit, how safe that made him feel.

This…

Something old and painful broke in his chest. For a single moment, he could have sworn he actually felt his own heart _beat_.

Roxas was close against him. His face rested on his shoulder, his nose tucked in against the curve of Zexion’s neck. His arms were a tight circle of warmth, their bodies close together. Blond hair tickled his nose and mouth, and all he could smell was sea-salt and the warmth of sunbaked stones in Twilight Town.

He inhaled once, and memorised the smell of that warmth.

And then he, with simple courtesy, returned the embrace. It was nothing but a quick squeeze of his arms, a simple touch on the shoulder. Then he stepped back, his face cool and composed, as if this midnight rendezvous had never occurred.

“I would suggest that you sleep. You will have more missions tomorrow, and you will not do well if you have not rested.”

“Okay,” Roxas said. He offered him a smile that was almost too bright, because it was almost too real. When was the last time Zexion had _ever_ made somebody smile? When had _Ienzo_ ever made somebody smile? That ache in his chest intensified, and he could only offer Roxas a simple courteous nod of acknowledgement.

“Goodnight.”

“Goodnight!”

The boy disappeared out the door.

Zexion laid both of his hands on his chest and held his breath.

There was no heartbeat.

No.

Of course there wasn’t.

Why on earth _should_ there have been?

After a careful moment of contemplation, Zexion decided that the answer to that question was too dangerous to begin to acknowledge. He prepared himself for bed instead. But even as he was drifting off to sleep, he could not help but allow himself one hand on the empty hollow where his heart should have been beneath his chest.

Just in case.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short one this time, but I hope you all enjoy. :) If you did, please let me know! And a special shout-out to telltael_exe for their wonderful support.


	5. Roxas

_Ventus._

_Sora._

_Ventus._

_Sora._

The names were like a phantom heartbeat. Roxas held them in his mind and savoured the warmth of the memories that came from their comforting weight.

This time, when he sank into bed, it was almost too easy to fall asleep. And when he did, he dreamed.

_The stars are shining above and the garden is filled with warm silver light. The green grass ends abruptly, and an ocean of mist stretches out to faraway mountains. Braziers of light hover from elegant golden sculptures amongst the trees. The air is warm with summer, and fresh mountain air that he knows he has never tasted filled his lungs._

_He cannot remember their faces, not yet. But he sees flashes of them._

_Keyblade shadows clash together and their metallic clang is lost beneath the sound of their laughter. There is a girl with a warm smile: she fights with elegant, dancing strokes. He can only catch snatches of blue from her: hair, eyes, dress, keyblade. But he likes her, and when she smiles at him he feels something warm stir in his stomach like butterflies._

_Then there is a boy with a deep, hearty chuckle and powerful blows. Something about the shape of his worn, honest face is discordantly familiar, even though he cannot understand his face in the way he normally does. It is like reading a book in another language: he can see the characters, yet take no meaning from them. It makes Roxas afraid, and he knows the fear is his own in a memory that is not. But he cannot recognise why, and though it is wonderful to **feel** discomfort, that is _nothing _compared to the sweet happiness that he is just learning can exist._

He rolled over, and the memory changed.

_Now he is on a beach. The sun is high in the azure sky and the smell of the sea fills the air. The sand is so white it almost hurts his eyes, and the ocean is sparkling bluer than anything he has ever seen. Somewhere close by is the scent of tropical, coastal fruits, and when he looks up he can see a yellow star growing on a palm tree._

Papou fruit, _he thinks, and realises now that he is learning as much from these foreign memories as he is from his own life. Right now he is both learning and remembering what it means to have a heart. His emotional spectrum is full of exhilaration and happiness and the thrill of a challenge, and he pushes himself further into the warmth of these feelings that make his heart beat and his blood rush through hot veins._

 _He is running across the sand. There is a finish line, somewhere, and each step is strong and steady as he sprints towards it. This body is weighted exactly like his own: step for step, breath for breath. The way the muscles move is unfamiliar, leaps and jumps and the way his feet sink in the sand and his shoes get soggy with seawater, but he knows that it is_ his _body._

_So this is who he was._

_But before he can dwell on this he has reached the finish line, and a happy laugh wins out from him. It is a warm, full laugh, of light and life and love. Roxas likes it so much that he is thrilled when he laughs again, and the sound sends warmth to the ends of his tingling fingertips. There are conversations happening outside, and he can feel his own mouth moving to form words, hear the warm timbre of his own voice, but he is too absorbed in the rich emotions emanating from the memory to focus on what’s happening._

_But all too soon it’s fading._

_Then it’s gone._

_He wakes._

\--

The sun is setting the same way it always is, and Roxas feels emptier than he ever has.

The only thing that makes a difference is Axel.

He _laughs_ in a way the other members don’t. Whether it’s real or not, it _sounds_ real, and _that_ makes it sound almost like music. He can appreciate that, though not with any true feelings behind it. He wouldn’t have known that before the dreams had started.

But he’s dreaming every night, now, and waking up is the worst thing imaginable. Except his life is the real thing, and the dreams aren’t, and suddenly he turns to Axel in the middle of one of those ringing laughs where his green eyes are crinkled shut and his hand is waving a lazy circle of amused flames in the air.

“Are you really happy?”

“Aw, c’mon, Roxas. Don’t be asking things like that.”

“I mean it. I want to know!”

It was like watching the waves wash writing on the sand away. Another memory that wasn’t his own, he reflected without any kind of bitterness even though he _wanted_ to _be_ bitter. But it was just like that: the water coming in, the sand fading. Axel’s expression was smoothed clear and clean, his forehead relaxing, his mouth a neutral line.

He looked straight out at the sunset, squinting against the bright light.

“I dunno. You know what they say about Nobodies. It’s not like it used to be, that’s for sure. But maybe there’s something there, after all. All I know, Roxas, is that – if it’s real – it’s been real since _you_ showed up. Squirt.”

In one of those swift, fluid, beautiful movements he’s turned – all red hair and fire – and then his hands are on Roxas, tickling under his arms and over his stomach. And before he can help himself, Roxas is laughing too, _laughing,_ and there’s a bright burst of joy in his stomach that spreads white warmth all the way to his fingertips. Then Axel’s laughing again, and his fingers are linked lazily behind his head and he’s reclining in a way that makes his back crack-crack-crack.

“You tell me. You feel anything then?”

Roxas doesn’t need to answer, and Axel knows it. When he sits up again, resuming his normal pose – one knee up, one hand out for balance – Roxas lightly places his hand atop it. Axel doesn’t say anything, but Roxas _sees_ that quiet smile furl like flame across his face.

Axel makes the emptiness go away. And for now, in these hours spent with him, that’s enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone and I apologise for the delay! Good news: the next chapter is already written, and I'll post it soon. :) I hope that you're all doing well out there. If you're enjoying this so far, please let me know!


	6. Zexion

He would have laid down what remained of his life for the Organisation.

It was a brotherhood of shadows. Men and women whose hearts had been taken by living darkness, and were now nothing more than twisted memories of who they had been. He may not have felt those emotions himself, but he certainly understood them more – at times, far more than he was credited for.

Of course it was broken. _All_ of them were. Locked together in an existential joke, and one that Zexion found a little too amusing sometimes. He loved to act out the emotions that he should have felt, loved to be the Schemer who knew more than he should. But his courtesy to others was his way of caring for them, and he was content with that.

Or so he had been.

He walked in a tight circle. His chin was resting on his hand, brow furrowed in thought. His nostrils were flared to catch the scents on the air. Against his fingers he murmured quiet equations: meaningless to the task at hand, but the white noise of his own voice and familiar rhythm of the numbers locked out the echoing emptiness of the castle chambers.

_Castle Oblivion._

The name made distrust stir in his stomach. He knew what those wrecked ruins had once been: knew how much that world had once meant to the boy who was not Roxas. A mission there was not of his design, and _as_ a schemer, he would have thought his design meant more than it did.

_Sss._

He turned sharply.

Indigo and black whirled together in a silent ring. There was no sign of the caster, but Zexion did not need to _see_ to catch the thick smell of desert dust and decaying metal that came from the opened corridor. It had been almost a decade, maybe more, but the smell of the Keyblade Graveyard never faded from the folds of his black cloak.

_Xemnas._

He did not hesitate. To do so would only invite suspicion. But as he walked forward, he could only help but wonder whether this mission would be his last.

 

* * *

 

“I have an assignment for you.”

“Yes, Superior?”

They stood atop the tallest tower of the Castle. Zexion knelt on the tile, his hair whipping about his face in the cold wind. Their black cloaks fluttered around them, and his breath came in thin, cold hisses between clenched teeth. Still he did not move, nor even lift his gaze to meet the Superior’s eyes.

_You are the reason Ienzo died._

He should not have cared about that as much as he did. In fact, he ought not to have cared about it at all. Still, as his bangs lashed against his skin and stung tears from his eyes, it was hard not to dwell on it. Still, Zexion remained obedient and quiet, awaiting his new commands.

“You are aware of our history, of course. Perhaps even more so than those… involved.”

He inclined his head an inch lower in acknowledgement of the truth. Because Ienzo had been the one to suggest the underground laboratory, of course – because their master could never have denied him anything, and oh, _those_ memories of a father figure would ache if he had the capacity to feel it. Ienzo had betrayed him just as he had been betrayed by the man who stood before Zexion.

“There is a room within Castle Oblivion. There is something very… important within it. _You_ must find it, Zexion.”

“Yes, Superior.”

“It is called the Chamber of Waking.”

_So it begins._

He knew about the two chambers, of course: Repose and Waking. The former was of their own design in Radiant Garden; the latter, built by the magic of a keyblade master. But it had not been Xemnas who had told him about that.

How long had it been since his conversation with Xigbar on the staircase? Marluxia had just become their eleventh member; Larxene was recruited almost a day later. He did not know what had motivated Xigbar to betray Xemnas’ secret to him, though he suspected it was because he was simply better at _using_ the information that he had.

Now, he kept his face devoid of emotion, and waited.

“One of my… friends… is there. One of yours, too, I believe.”

For a man who had no heart, the malice in the word _friend_ was undeniable. Zexion blinked hair out of his watering gaze and waited.

“You must find the room, and report to me immediately. Marluxia will be your commanding officer within Castle Oblivion, but in this matter you act alone and independent of his orders. Do not _fail_ me.”

“I will not.”

“Good. Look at me.”

Zexion raised his head. His vision was obscured by fluttering ribbons of his own violet hair. Xemnas bestowed a benevolent smile upon him, and the weight of it was like a bruising blow across his back. The orange eyes smouldered.

“You are the most loyal of my Organisation. You have served me well. That is why I trust you with this. Go, now. Do what must be done.”

A dull and empty ache ran through Zexion’s chest. He only inclined his head. A moment later, the black flames of a corridor had engulfed him, and he was kneeling on the floor of his own bedroom. For a moment all he could smell was darkness, and then sea-salt and sand and sunset overwhelmed him.

He turned, and saw Roxas sleeping upon his bed.

The heart that he should not have had began to ache again. Zexion looked up at the ceiling and sighed.

“You,” he informed the sleeping boy, “make my life more difficult than necessary.”

He moved around his room, collecting books from the shelves. His movements were as calm and as measured as before, though they made little to no sound. A footstep on tile was almost too quiet; a breath between slightly parted lips was little more than a stirring of the cold air. His eyes were still watering from the wind on the tower, though now - with some faint ache in his chest - he wondered if it might not have been something more... emotional. 

Ridiculous. 

But as he turned, books hugged to his chest, he saw Roxas asleep in his bed once again. The messy halo of blond hair over the clean white pillow. 

_What happens to you if Ventus wakes?_

_What of our mission to collect Kingdom Hearts, and your ability to wield a keyblade?_

_What about me?_

The last question was not one that he ever would have uttered, but even more than the others, it weighed on his mind. It was not a betrayal to the Organisation to think of himself on this one occasion: no, he already had the answer that they needed. Regardless of whether Ventus, Sora  _or_ Roxas wielded the Keyblade, Kingdom Hearts would continue to bloom. Their mission would be completed. 

But Roxas and Ventus... 

Could they both survive? Would he have to choose? And why, why,  _why_ was  _Marluxia_ of all people in charge of Castle Oblivion? 

Disquieted and disturbed, Zexion continued to load books into a black bag. It was only when a white hand wrapped around his wrist that he allowed himself to pause and look down at Roxas.

"Stop thinking," Roxas mumbled. He opened a sleepy eye at him. "C'mere." 

Zexion, for once in his life, cast aside all logic and did just that. Roxas fell asleep beside him, his teenager's arms wrapped around Zexion's own child-adult body. And before he could help it, Zexion too had drifted off to sleep beside him.  


End file.
